The Bahir

One of those books that you always wanted to buy but always procrastinated. So I finally bought it and yes, fantastic reading. Perfect for a long flight or a lazy summer afternoon by the pool and anything in-between. There is a lot of wisdom in this book and just as much knowledge and info. Very well sourced as well.

Learning book

This one I think maybe the cliff notes but it is all that's need. It is a mind blowing book if you are a religious person an want talk religion and you HAVEN'T read this book or the zohar.....GO AWAY.... comeback when you have.

This Tome Of Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan Is Another Outstanding Work Of This Treasured Rabbi. I Highly Recommend This Book.

Rabbi Kaplan has translated this complicated text on the letters of Creation and the entire spiritual blueprint that is represented by the Torah.

After researching and studying Kabbalah for over 20 years, I found this book to contain detailed technical translations of Jewish Mysticism so often unavailable to a beginning student of Hebrew. After studying 12 languages, actually 13 including Hebrew now, I found detailed alphabetical descriptions and related materials to be a great primer for the Hebrew language, especially in relation to Jewish Kabbalistic interpretation of its relativity to this religion. I absolutely recommend this book to anyone who wants to study this language, although there are relatively little provisions for syntax, linguistic descriptions, etc. other than a detailed descriptions of letters relating to interpretations. I still recommend Gershom Sholem's translation for the beginner Kabbalah student, although one should really wait (as recommended by the sages) until at least their 35th birthday! It can get very depressing and mess with your heart, mind and soul, if you are not already prepared for the depth of Kabbalah study in general! The Bahir is very unique from previous Kabbalistic works that I have studied in the past, including the Sefer Yetzirah, the Zohar, etc. I had studied these for quite some time before indulging in the study of the Bahir, and I am very glad I did, because I would probably be very lost in some of the interpretations and relative inferences to what I had previously studied. In relation to previous studies, the Bahir is EXTREMELY detailed and technical in orientation and provides a deeper understanding of the values of Hebrew letters in relation to their "relative mystical meanings", especially in relation the the 10 Seiferot and their mystical significance. Aside from a few English typos, I found the book to be quiet professional in addressing details about interpretations of Kabbalistic mysticism. For a gentile lacking general knowledge of many aspects of the Jewish language, religion and culture, except for a few friends in Malibu that probably have never heard of this book, or if so, probably are barely aware of its contents, just as I am pretty unfamiliar with my Catholic religious heritage...(I flunked freshman religion at my Catholic high school!) I really learned more about the "Christian" old testament through studying the Jewish religion(s)and Kabbalah, as I found mysticism to be more intersting and closer to truth than mainstream "religions". Kaplan provides exceptional translations of this work, however I have nothing with which to compare this work, as this was my first Bahir experience. I found several of the other reviews here to be quite helpful and accurate in representing the significance of this work and translation, also contributing to my selection of this work by this specific author/translator. He does give a very detailed historical representation of progression of Kabbalah in general in the introduction. My primary interest in this book was the "technical interpretations" of more detailed aspects of mystical interpretation of the Sefer Yetzirah, the ten Seiferot, etc.

A book of Great Power to Enlighten the world! Metaphysical Judisam is one of God's most precious gifts to humanity and is a Key to answer many of the Mysteries that perplex Mankind today! Keep reading folks!

I have to read it and reread it. It has so much information concerning the Hebrew language. I a. A beginner so if someone else has greater depth of knowledge. They may not find it so deep. I find it fascinating.

An excellent book about the origins of Man and our Universe. Now I am learning Aramaic so that I can go back and read and understand the Bible.

The best edition

Of course, the text of the Bahir itself is not the work of Rabbi Kaplan, but more than half of this book consists of his analyses of the text and guide notes thereon. After reading the introduction I found myself actually reading a large portion of the commentary before realising that I had barely touched upon the text itself. The text is a beautiful treat of esoteric writing which would be understood by very few, the commentary itself attempts to elucidate this cryptic writing and for the most seems perfectly on point. It would be best read as intended, to take in the text on its own and see what can be understood through exploring the writing in a meditative state, The commentary can almost be read as a book in itself if you already have a form of understanding what is being explained, but even the commentary is of course speaking of concepts which require some form of mystical work and vision to truly understand. As someone who is most closely a Hermetist, it is fascinating to read into this area and see the way that the Jewish mystics have interpreted the universal workings and relationship to the Divine and also to explore the beautiful hieroglyphic language of Hebrew and the joyous coding of the Hebrew scripture. I am exploring this alongside study of the Zohar and Sepher Yetzirah, and though the concepts of Divinity may already be understood it is just beautiful to see it stated in such a way and fascinating to see it all stated in such an expansive manner and to learn more about such misunderstood Hebrew scripture which has been so unfortunately rejected by the so called "rationalists" in our world. Perhaps if these people were able to understand the Qabalistic keys then they would not so blindly reject the notion of "God" as can even in this sense be explained through modern science as it finally catches up with the truths of the Ancients. It is plain to see, even more so from his work with the Sepher Yetzirah, that Rabbi Kaplan has truly been raised to the Greater Mind and he is one of the only writers on the subject of Qabalah with whose writing I can really connect. This is a subject which has been greatly diluted and profaned by the New Age movements even since the writers on the Golden Dawn. Many write on Qabalah, many hold the concepts in theory, but it seems that very few writers truly understand.

It is a must read for beginners of Kabbalah..it is a great translation and has a very good comments and explanation on a very encompassing and hard subject.

So happy to find this book. It’s worth the wait.